Metro 2033: Radioactive Paradise
by cmartin1
Summary: While Artyom is busy fighting the Dark Ones in the Moscow Metro, in the United States an entirely different situation is unfolding. Come with me on a journey across post-nuclear America.
1. Chapter 1

Caleb Martin

October 18, 2012

Period 4

"US vs. China: Who Will Win?" proclaimed today's headline of the Washington Post. The headline had many of the residents of Longview, Texas worried. While it was no secret that this " Second Cold War" between the United States and China over oil was no secret, it seemed to be escalating out of control. Each side had thousands of nuclear weapons pointed at each other which caused a new era in civil defense to emerge. Fallout shelters were retrofitted across the nation and Longview even had its own medium-sized shelter underneath the Good Shepard Medical Center near downtown. Whenever a bit of news concerning possible military or nuclear conflict appeared the Walmarts in town would always run out of supplies. People took everything and I mean _everything_ from that wretched store even if it had no real survival uses. I saw a guy in there taking large set of basketballs for God's sake. Eventually after four miserable months of tension , the U.S. and China could not settle their differences and ended up scorching the Earth with thermonuclear fire. I, working at the Good Shepard Medical Center as a family practice doctor took refuge with 4683 (as our later census data revealed) co-workers, schoolchildren, accountants and a variety of other downtown patrons in the hospital's shelter. We lived (kind of) in the shelter for 14 terrible years. Another year, another thousand people added. The shelters maximum designed capacity was a mere 5,000 people but now it had swelled to eighteen going on nineteen thousand. People were being put in places that were never considered as suitable living spaces. Ten families are somehow living in the sewage outflow tunnel. Along with space, food became a definite issue. The overpopulated shelter had now resorted to eating the rats and roaches that scurried along the wall as a food source to feed its giant population. Then we finally decided to leave, to think that what remained of Longview had to be better than the shelter filled everyone with a sense of optimism, but it was not that easy. The city was untouched by the bombs so most of the building's decay was a result of nature not man. Unrecognizable mutant creatures prowled the streets and pockets of raiders and survivalist existed. Neither would go down without a fight. People saw the mutants as a great food source yet were hesitant to eat them due to the fact that we knew very little about their physiology. A few people died from eating some unknown diseased mutant caterpillars but the remaining former doctors (such as myself) from Good Shepard dissected several of the new creatures. Most were found to be safe to eat particularly the two-headed cow known as Brahmin. They made some great burgers. The gangs were a real pain though, they banded together in order to fight us. The "war" lasted several months before we finally won. Any surviving gang members either assimilated (adding _another_ 1,567 people to our population ) or were summarily executed. For years the some-what rebuilt city of Longview thrived as it is situated along Interstate 20. It became a trading town in which our top notch Brahmin were sold to travelling merchants for supplies that we needed. As time went on Longview got bigger and a bit richer and life went on. One day new visitors appeared. They called themselves the " Texas Rangers" and were a group of approximately sixty- thousand based around Dallas (or what is left of it).They were the source of most of traders who had practically dumped their money into the city. It was a mutual relationship Longview gave Dallas Brahmin for food and in return Dallas dumped its money into Longview. After five profitable years of this, the Texas Ranger Congress of Dallas annexed Longview to create its 13th state of Longview. The town's population exploded afterwards as people from all over the "Texas Union '', as they called it, wanted to strike it rich in Longview and the small towns that sprang up around it as Brahmin ranchers. Land and water was never much of a problem with the ranchers but manpower was. The ranchers had a critical deficiency in workers which hindered their profits which the State of Longview would collect as taxes. The state needed a solution so they created one in a way. They set up what they called the State of Longview Department of Labor and Industry in the old Texas State Bank and Trust building. However the department had no real solution because they had no way of obtaining a mass of cheap workers only the occasional few. They needed a desperate solution. Luckily, they found one.


	2. Chapter 2

Caleb Martin

Period 4

November 6, 2012

What happened the next day was particularly odd. One of our forward scouts positioned on Interstate 20 towards Shreveport hurried into town with a delighted look on his face. He reported to the high school band director turned Longview Head of Commerce Director Sanks with a message of urgency. When told the news, Sanks ran into his office and supposedly was on the phone with President Pierce of the Texas Union himself. The rumor around town was that first contact had been made with a "major player" from Shreveport. Their caravan had been stopped on I-20 by the guard and was awaiting clearance to pass into town. The caravan numbered 29 semi-truck trailers being pulled by Brahmin. As to what was in the trailers was a mystery. The group stuck on the Interstate kept shouting that they brought gifts from a land even wealthier than ours. This caused the people in town to go berserk thinking that the caravan had things that were lost forever. Old Man Johnson thought that the caravan had his children and wife inside even though they had died during their trip to Boston when the bombs fell. These were no ordinary traders though.

Sanks finally let them through and they proceeded on South Street with much fanfare. As they trudged through the potholed roads they were tossing free cans of food out of generosity to the refugees and gypsies who were crawling out of their tents along the street. They even had a marching band following them, whom Sanks criticized their marching style. The procession turned onto Green Street and stopped in downtown. They set up a makeshift stage and asked for everyone to congregate here in one hour for a very special announcement. The apparent leader Mr. Montgomery strolled into the State of Longview Capitol Building asking to see the Governor who was meeting with the President in Dallas. While the Governor was away Sanks was in charge and so he was to represent the whole State of Longview and for that matter the entire Texas Union. It was noon and the presentation started. Nearly the whole state was in attendance flooding all of downtown. Mr. Montgomery stood on the stage with a megaphone and claimed that the Confederate States of America had been reborn and again controlled the American South. Montgomery claimed that on behalf of the CSA these gifts were a gesture of goodwill and future cooperation as neighbors. The unloading of tractor-trailers had begun. The first 4 trailers were filled with cotton and looming machines to process it. Everyone's clothes were falling apart so it was a godsend. Two trailers were filled to the brim with cartons of cigarettes and every alcohol imaginable. The alcoholics and smokers were thrilled as they were reeling from withdrawals. Another trailer was filled was filled with various medicines and medical devices. Me and other Good Shepard doctors were happy as exotic viruses were being brought in from where ever the traders, refugees, and gypsies were hailing from. Two trailers were filled with cans of food and hogs. The other twenty trailers were a shocker. The first opened and out walked people actual people! 23 black people walked out all chained up. The other nineteen trailers let out the captive blacks and the lot totaled 387. They merged into a long line and proceeded towards the stage. Montgomery proclaimed that these were fresh slaves from Shreveport and there was to be an auction later tonight. I was in shock from the CSA visit. The Brahmin farmers were all headed to the auction to purchase farm hands and I was disgusted. I never thought in a million years that our land would revert to one of the cruelest practices in human history, slavery. I thought that more townspeople would be against slavery but it was the talk of the town. Many revered the Confederates as gods. The farmers and ranchers wanted slaves to help in the fields, the traders saw the slaves as an economic gold mine, and the shopkeepers wanted slaves to do all their tedious work. But none were more excited than Sanks who thought that trade with the Confederates would truly turn Longview as _the _economic powerhouse of the Texas Union. Of course the Governor never authorized or even saw the CSA deal even go down and slavery was outlawed in all 13 states of the Texas Union by the President himself. When the Governor came back, things would get interesting.


	3. Chapter 3

Caleb Martin

December 2, 2012

Period 4

Chapter 3

The Governor pulled into town on a sunny afternoon, I believe it was Tuesday but my calendar burnt when I tried my hand at cooking and I've felt too embarrassed to ask since. Nevertheless the mayor had a solemn look on his face as he strolled out of scorched, unreliable, bullet-ridden 1969 Lincoln Continental. He walked into the Longview State Capitol Building and practically disappeared. State senators and congressmen soon followed and an eerie feeling gripped the building as no one knew what was going on inside. The President of the Texas Union felt that folks ought to be educated on the "happenings" of his states, so the State of Longview got federal "funding" for a state newspaper. It was a rather rudimentary setup. The government had procured and model of a medieval-style printing press from an "antiques" (junk) dealer who raided a science museum in Dallas. Well when I woke up the next day a sharp thud hit my door and to my delight I had received Longview's first state newspaper. The paper was odd for it was that kind of Revolutionary War type parchment and the letters were styled in medieval fonts so it was odd compared to my pre-war papers I was used to. It was only one double sided page but I applauded their efforts. I shot my eyes down to the one and only headline: War Grips the Nation! I was shocked to see that even after the apocalypse people would still go to war as if surviving wasn't hard enough. I read the proceeding article: "_Dear people of the mighty fine Texas Union, Our fine nation has come under the attack of an enemy unlike that of any of which we have ever encountered. Led on the belief that slavery and discrimination is once again acceptable. They attempted to lure our people into their seditious acts with petty gifts and we will have no part in it. This 'Confederate States of America' must be no more and so we will kill their people just as they have killed ours. Sincerely Your President, Richard Pierce. _Several more articles followed providing a more in-depth look at this atrocity. Apparently a Confederate delegation, similar to the one that corrupted Sanks here, also stopped in the coastal city of Houston. They had way more supplies than the group that stopped and hence this group used six ships stolen from some naval base near Jacksonville, Florida. Houstonians were quite confused as the 6 naval frigates docked at the port. The gentlemen in Houston must have had some sense of morality because when heard the Confederates speak about their view on slavery he yelled at dem' southern boys to "get their asses a runnin'" and that no one dared insult the laws of the great Texas Union. The Governor of the State of Houston, Sam Brown, ordered a military strike on the CSA ships as they fled and killed many people on both sides. The President saw the situation as unacceptable and had all governors, senators and congressmen convene in Dallas to plan further action. They chose war. It was a two-part plan a huge naval-based offensive on the coastal CSA cities amassing in Houston and a humungous land assault to capture interior Southern cities and eventually their capital, Atlanta. I was disappointed with the decision of war as conscription was now in effect. The next part had me worried. The first part of the land assault was to take all Southern border cities starting with the crucial CSA garrison border city of Shreveport. Forces were to set up a fort along Interstate 20 _behind us_ in nearby Tyler, Texas. We were screwed as the only protection we would get would be the occasional regiment passing through town not to mention that Sanks and the ranchers and the businessmen had been secretly been dealing with the Confederates for slaves. Every male 16 and older was forced to go to the conscription meeting in the Capitol Building to protect the fatherland. I was quite nervous as I really did not want to be picked to go I felt I was better suited remaining as one of the town's few remaining doctors. There were _only_ about 40,000 males living in Longview and they were only taking about 5,000. The economic boom in town had attracted not only survivors from Texas but also Southern defectors, Oklahomans and Mexicans so Longview had become the 4th biggest city in the Texas Union after Dallas, Houston, and El Paso. We had plenty of people to conscript making us one of the first to be sent into battle. They were simply pulling names out of a hat and there was a one in nine chance of getting picked and I was scared. It was pretty upsetting that possibly my neighbors and friends would be returning without limbs, horrific wounds and even worse, they might not return at all. The drawings began and some laughed excited to be picked to serve while others cried for having to leave their families. The drawings went on for hours and were brutal. Just as I had thought they were over the announcer spoke something about a Home Guard and a new set of names were drawn. Then everything changed as a name was called that sounded all too familiar. It was mine. 


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4 Caleb Martin

Period 4

January 17, 2013

I was to be shipped out to Fort Reaper which was being set up about fifteen miles to the east of Longview along Interstate 20. I was being sent out with a few others from town to help form the Texas Territorial Home Guard. Our purpose was to set up a 'defensive perimeter' around the Texas border and around any major city to hold the line in case of a Confederate counter- offensive. I was scared of what we were headed to yet I was doubtful that any Confederate force, large or small, would be able make it across the border without being slaughtered. I also knew we were on the offensive team but the 'mighty' Texas Union was about to kick a hornet's nest. The mornings in Longview grew ever colder and it was a sign that winter was encroaching. It was one of the only ways of telling time these days and the few working clocks had their own dedicated staff to keep them running. Leaky water pipes had icicles beginning to form around them and sixty or so other Home Guard soldiers and I were huddled together dreadfully waiting for our transport to arrive and ship us out to Fort Reaper. Rumor had it that even Home Guardians from as far as Dallas, Houston, El Paso, and San Antonio were coming to either Fort Reaper or several forts just like it all over our country.

Our rides had finally come and the vehicles were substandard. While the _real_ soldiers were being trained for an upcoming invasion, we were all cramped into a slew of decrepit Volkswagen 'hippie Buses' and we were off on our way. The journey was quite unpleasant as someone kept passing gas and the abandoned backcountry roads were riddled with potholes and at some points nonexistent. Parts of the Interstate had become littered with the rusting hulks of abandoned cars making it impassable to our large convoy of eight or nine buses. So instead we took the road less traveled to our destination.

After five miles of hell we finally arrived at the fort. It was a huge and menacing structure that stood out of the ground. It had been a church at some point or another, one of those mega-'televangelist' ones, I believe. The backside of the structure was the original part of the church. The Texas Union Armed Forces added their own defensive 'pizazz' to the rest of it. The crumbling walls had been replaced with cheap cinder block and plywood ones a recon tower made of old school buses jutted through the roof. It was dusk now and far off in the distance one could see the city lights of nearby Tyler, Texas. Tyler was about a quarter of the size of Longview and it was a cesspit. Even though it was less than forty miles from Longview it was not part of our state but instead was part of its own narrow border state that went as far north as Texarkana. It had a notorious reputation for being Texas' Las Vegas. About ninety percent of its economy was centered around organized crime. Gambling, prostitution, illegal drugs, and gangs ran the city to the ground. Sometimes their garbage comes running down to use along the Interstate but it keeps our law enforcement in employment.

After some exterior sightseeing we entered the fort and the inside was humongous. In its pre-war state it must have been able to hold thousands. The interior seemed more like a cave not a building. Around two-hundred of us were stationed here and all of us seemed to barely be noticeable in the huge church. You could tell the fort had been hastily erected, the church pews became beds, a 'war room' had been established by the altar, and sledgehammer-sized holes were punched into the walls to serve as gun ports. The church was designed more like an auditorium and hence was multi-story. I walked up the stairs to the second floor and saw crate after crate of just about everything. Food, water, medical supplies, guns, and bullets, lots of bullets filled the place from floor to ceiling. I was surprised that a group our size would need this many supplies but it turned out that it was not for us. This is also a last minute rest stop for regiments marching into the unknown to take the Confederates. There was a third floor as well but it seemed inaccessible as someone had apparently demolished the staircase. What bits I could see from the second floor seemed odd. The floor seemed to be laden with all kinds of makeshift explosives! Everything from barrels of gunpowder to propane tanks lined the walls and I was taken back.

Confused, I decided to ask our squad leader Lieutenant Gentry about the purpose of the bombs. He said that should the Confederates manage to overrun Fort Reaper we will evacuate and our 'general' will blow the place, after all it's not only a way into Texas but also a supply goldmine. We will take some of them down. Our leader, General Bustamante, was a numbers man. He was obsessed with numbers and statistics and was hell-bent that the Confederates would never be capable of crossing the Texas Union border because it "calculated out to be near-impossible.

At dinner Lt. Gentry pulled out a little metal green box out from his satchel and set it on the table. He called our squad to gather around and so we listened attentively. He opened the box and inside was a dozen or so little black pills. We were each given one and instructed not to eat it unless we were captured.

"What is it?" asked one of the guys. I think he was a barber back in Longview, Russian American I believe.

"It is cyanide." replied Gentry. The Russian was shocked; I think his name was Sergei Vladimirovich or something like that.

"I could never take my own life! God forbids suicide! I'd go straight to Hell!" Sergei shrieked.

Lt. Gentry laughed, "Listen _altar boy_, a Confederate prisoner is going straight to Hell anyways. Trust me the pill is faster."

Sergei was getting upset, "I wish I was back in Ukraine, at least there I wouldn't be dealing with this crap!" He was Ukrainian American not Russian, but who cares.

"Yeah but then what? You would be sitting in post-nuclear and frozen Ukraine getting attacked by hostile mutants and who knows what else is out there." claimed Gentry.

"You think that you are so smart. In Kiev where I lived there is a subway system that was designed to be deep enough to double as a bomb shelter. All the former Soviet countries had the same deal. You know the Cold War and stuff, right?" said Sergei.

But the lieutenant persisted, "And then what, you are going to just lay down arms and leave your fate in the hands of half a century old Soviet technology? You really believe that a communist regime who couldn't even feed its own citizens will build bunkers for them?"

Thankfully Sergei realized that Gentry would not stop until he won so Sergei let him win. As Sergei stormed off deeper into the church a little plop was heard in the trashcan and a small black pill was seen in there.

Inspection started early in the morning and it was by far my least favorite part of the endless days here. If the General found something out of line he would hit you with his 'whippin stick' which was an old novelty whip from a souvenir shop based around some old adventure movie. The Stick, as we called it, stung the surface of the skin for quite some time and I still have pink line rolling down my back from the last several inspections. Life at Fort Reaper was boring. Cooking here, a game of cards there but otherwise the days had begun blur together as one meaningless existence. I did not want to fight them no matter how cruel they are. I am tired of crawling around in the dark and I even contemplated taking Gentry's "Magic Black Pills" today but could not bring myself to do it.

A sat asleep when I noticed a hissing noise and a light yellow cloud of who knows what flooding the room. A began to tear up as a burning sensation filled my eyes. My vision became increasingly clouded and soon I could not see. I heard yelling and I yelled a response in pain back. The yells escalated into screams as the pain became unbearable. The cloud entered my lungs and I could not refrain from puking in a desperate attempt to get _it _out of my lungs. It hurt to breathe and I could hear others screaming out too. Our cowardly attackers were suppressing us with tear gas. The battle had already hit home before we even could make the first move.

Soon a series of thunderous crashing noises rung my eardrums and soon after I heard lots of gunfire, screaming and explosions. The noises drew closer and I had no choice but to either die or hide. Blinded, I dropped to the ground and made my way to one of the nearest church pews. I hid and I could slowly feel the pain subsiding but I still couldn't see. Hiding, I fumbled blindly for my automatic and my pistol but I must have dropped my gun because I only felt my pistol in its holster. After a good ten minutes of waiting under the pew, the fighting was now practically on top of me. I still could not see and nervously hoped that I would not be found. I heard more screaming and Lt. Gentry started the evacuation out. He was going to blow the place and I couldn't see a way out. I found a potentially safe corner and hid.

I could hear a victory cheer from the Confederates as I could hear the sounds of the ancient VW Buses driving off. I could not see the blast as the building begun to collapse but I could feel the fire licking my skin so delicately. The Confederates were frantically trying to flee the massive structure as it crumbled around them. More screams and then this beast of a building finally came for me. I could hear a support column or ceiling collapsing and then felt as a ton of rubble buried me alive. I had survived but my ribs may have been broken. More screams as the dead were busy dying. I couldn't take the pain anymore and blacked out.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Caleb Martin

Period 4

February 9, 2013

I woke up face to face with the darkness. My body ached all over and I was trapped under a mountain of rubble. Between the pain and the rubble I could move no more than a foot in any direction. I sat motionless for a while in the dark, formulating a plan to get out of what must have been five feet of rubble on top of me. I would try to dig myself out with a smashed plank of wood lying beside my leg. It must have been dark outside as well as no sunlight shone through the cracks in the mountain. After spending a half hour only to go half a foot I took a break. I heard some faint sounds from up above and tried to listen in closer. It sounded like scratching and crunching. I looked through one of the crevices in the rubble and saw it. A hulking beast was there and it wasn't alone I could hear others further away. I laid there silently trapped, observing the huge mutant as it began to dig through some rubble only feet away from myself. The beast looked like the mutant descendant of a bear but the radiation had done its damages. Patches of its fur were missing and red sores covered some parts of its body. It continued to dig and I watched as it picked up the body of a trapped Confederate soldier and eat his torso. The soldier must have died some time ago, perhaps when Fort Reaper exploded because when the creature continued to eat the soldier he didn't make a single sound. These beasts were searching for food and this was perhaps vengeance for us killing so many the mutants for our needs. They served us well, they supplemented our Brahmin herds as food, some of their exoskeletons were used to reinforce our soldiers' armor, and some had toxins that could be used to lace darts and knives with. But to these foul creatures the slaughter here was a free buffet to them. They were scouring for more dead bodies to try and conquer their endless appetite. Soon they would come for me and I renewed my effort to dig myself out.

At first it was difficult, I felt like a snake slinking around these artificial catacombs for a way out but with time it became easier as I remembered the way to move different types of obstacles. It had been almost an hour and I could begin to feel the cold air blowing in from an entrance back onto the surface. I was so close to finally escaping the mutants and the underground labyrinth when I passed a dead body I recognized. It was the body of General Bustamante. The building didn't actually but instead it had appeared as if he had been shot in the head. Despite the general's fascination with calculations and numbers, he couldn't formulate a plan to save himself. I crawled out finally and stealthily walked away from the fort as to not attract any attention from the mutants feasting nearby. After being a hundred feet or so past the church my slow walk turned into a full-blown sprint. I set up a makeshift camp on a small cliff where off in the distance Longview's twinkling lights shone and maybe a mile behind me sat the collapsed and smoldering Fort Reaper. I was surprised that I had just survived the ordeal I did but my journey was not over. If the Confederates had in fact already made the first, surprising, move than I had to warn others to prevent more surprise attacks like that on Fort Reaper. I was exhausted and fell asleep.

I woke up the next morning and set off on my quest. I would make my way to Dallas and alert the government to their impending doom. As I started walking towards Interstate 20 I saw a huge camp of Confederate battalions set up along one of the onramps. They were preparing to take Longview and eventually Dallas and Houston by surprise and all these cities would be caught off-guard and overrun. The Interstate was no longer an option so I would take the southern back roads for a while and when I met the nearest Interstate I would head north towards Dallas. I found the nearest highway, Highway 259, and trudged down the endless road. Hours went by and yet I had gone only thirty miles. As the day wound down, I could see the lights of Henderson, Texas. Henderson was part of the State of Longview and in fact was the state's second largest city besides Longview itself. Henderson was another farming town and the economy was also mostly driven by Brahmin ranching. The town seemed friendly and had not been overrun yet but it was only a matter of time. I was able to get a small hotel room at a rundown La Quinta after bartering a pack of cigarettes. Henderson was far enough from Longview to be spared by the nuclear holocaust and the only damage here was from time and some of the more rowdy inhabitants. In fact, my hotel room had looked as it might have before the war. I had done enough walking and was ready to sleep.

The next day I woke up from the hotel room and set out again I hoped to achieve another thirty miles today and started walking further south along Highway 79. The land was humid and merciless as I walked, the roads had been cleared of all the broken down cars and it made the walk that much more miserable. I only passed the occasional traveler, farmer, or businessman every couple of miles. I was approaching the thirtieth mile marker when an oasis appeared. I had reached the outskirts Jacksonville, Texas. It also lay untouched (mostly) by the war and people lined the streets offering wares of all kinds. It was a town of scavengers and it was clearly thriving. Jacksonville had recently become the Texas Union's 26th state also called Jacksonville. It stretched from the northeast area around Jacksonville to the southwest in nearby Palestine, TX. The economy was based around scavenging and the inhabitants would irradiate themselves by crawling into abandoned buildings and looting nuked cities like Austin. They would bring back Old World luxuries like toilet paper, cigarettes, and new weapons. In fact the profession was so widespread in this state that in the center of Jacksonville stood a makeshift statue devoted to idolizing perhaps one of our nation's greatest scavengers. His name was known all across the Texas Union, "Wild Bill", he discovered a huge pre-war Army facility loaded with weapons and enough ammunition to last a lifetime. The newly formed government quickly moved in to secure the facility and it has since been nicknamed the "Birthplace of the Texas Union Armed Forces".

Jacksonville, while much smaller than Longview, looked a lot bigger. There was constant traffic along Highway 79 no matter what the time was. Brahmin, trucks, people, and bicycles hauled their treasure to here to be distributed to other cities like Dallas and Longview. I had to rent a tent as the town's two hotels were full due to the constant influx of businessmen to the area. I needed to get further than Palestine today so I caught a ride with a clan of scavengers headed towards Austin. It only cost me my harmonica and the condition that I treat one of their men who had a broken leg. I got on and tended to my duties and then took a lengthy nap to make the trip go faster. I woke to see the dead city. It was huge. The burnt and smoldering skeletons of skyscrapers could be seen in the distance. We were still twenty miles from the actual city but I could go no further as huge mutants spawned there and prowled the streets plus it was a radiation hot zone and I didn't have a protective suit with me.

They dropped me off and warned not to go into the city as it would be suicide. On the beltway going _around_ Austin sat a small town of survivors and it was there that I met a lone Texas Union sheriff. His town was comprised of some of the survivors that were in a nearby bomb shelter. I told him of the disaster at Fort Reaper and he was shocked. I told him I needed to meet President Pierce in Dallas but the sheriff insisted that I would be better off meeting Secretary of Defense Hughes. I agreed and asked for the quickest route to Dallas but according to the sheriff Hughes was not in Dallas but instead visiting the legendary city of San Antonio. That meant I would have to go even _further_ south and gaining entrance to mighty San Antonio was not easy. The sheriff had a beat up old Ducati that I could use to get to San Antonio. I took it and drove. The freeways were so much smoother than the backwater highways I had been walking and driving on all week. I was pushing 90 mph along I-35 and would be to San Antonio in no time. I was getting closer as the density of houses increased every mile I drove forward. I kept passing small towns of no more than thirty people. They were guard points for the power lines that spewed like tentacles from San Antonio. I was finally there.

I slowed the motorcycle as I approached the great walls of San Antonio. It wasn't easy getting in. Paranoia was king in this town and every visitor was carefully inspected and asked for proof of Texas Union citizenship. The walls around the city were huge, made up of abandoned vehicles such as buses, SUVs, and trucks. It was about twenty feet thick and roughly forty feet high. The city-state of San Antonio was a Sparta in its own sense. Every resident from six to sixty was trained to fight no matter their profession. The reason why? While most of San Antonio is a radioactive hellhole, once the fallout settled one building stood out from the wreckage. A lone intact nuclear power remained and while the façade contained minor damage the reactor continued to churn out power even with the absence of people. For a while the electricity was useless, all the power lines had become a twisted mass of steel and wood. The government realized the potential of the facility and sent hordes of technicians and engineers to restore electricity to our slice of the wasteland. Once the lines were repaired the power was flowing to almost everywhere in the Union and San Antonio was generating two-thirds of all electricity in the Union. The town became nationally-renowned for its technicians who could supposedly fix _anything_.

Meanwhile, the Old World American government had left us a parting gift in San Antonio. There was an Air Force base on the far side of the city, Randolph AFB, and shortly before they were nuked they made a frantic attempt to launch so biological weapons against the Chinese. Well the bombs hit before the bio-weapons could leave the ground and all kinds of vile diseases and ailments escaped the military vials. The bio-weapons coupled with the radiation spawned some rather large mutants that bullets alone could not stop. The nuke plant was regularly attacked by raiding Mexican drug gangs and the demon spawns from Randolph AFB so the Texas Union built a wall of defense around the half of San Antonio that contained the nuke plant and had all citizens train for battle should they end up getting attacked. A small city sprung up inside the walls which were filled with technicians who could build any useful device from the detritus of the previous wasteful society.

I saw the great city with my own eyes and had never seen a bigger place. I had never been to post-war Dallas and the biggest city I had visited was my hometown of Longview. No more than five years had passed since the Great War and already humanity had already seemed to be rebuilding the world it had lost. New societies had already emerged in the course of a year we as a species had adapted to accept our new world. I digress; the city had streets that went on for over a mile before hitting the wall and at the end of the main straight thoroughfare sat the towering power plant. Tramps, curious visitors, and traders lined the streets. Even the occasional beat-up truck would be seen attempting to push through the crowds. The streets were electrified and one could tell that the nuke power plant was clearly bringing a lot of dough. I needed to find Secretary Hughes but there were so many people it was like finding a needle in a haystack. I kept asking residents and they all pointed towards the monstrous power plant.

Then that was my destination. I started walking the boulevard with the crowd and remembered a childhood visit to New York City. I remembered the mass of people walking along the sidewalk as daily life and how San Antonio was that same thing but on a smaller scale. Perhaps someday we will be able to build our own new New York City in San Antonio. I continued along and stopped at a small café selling Turkish kebabs. I had never had one and was surprised that such culinary experiences had not been lost with the rest of the world. After finishing my food I continued to stroll down the avenue and was nearing the mighty power plant. The place was surrounded by a platoon of soldiers who made it clear that none shall pass. I needed to get inside the power plant but the soldiers would not listen to my cries for help. To them I was a Siren trying to lure them away from their post for God knows what. I was desperate and pulled out my pistol, ran into the crowd and fired a few shots. Panic ensued and that dragged the soldiers away temporarily. That was all I needed and quickly ran over to the entrance. I swung open the huge iron door and lay shocked. Secretary Hughes lay slumped over in the corner and a small group of worker surrounded him crying. He was dead.


	6. Chapter 6

Caleb Martin

Period 4

March 21, 2013

Chapter 6

Secretary Hughes had been assassinated by a Confederate spy who pretended to be part of his security detail. My journey to the great walled city of San Antonio had been pointless. I would now have to go to the capital in Dallas to hopefully get a meeting in with the President. I lingered around town for two more days before I decided to leave. I did lots of shopping and resupplied for the long road ahead. I would not be walking the hundred miles to Dallas and I had pawned off the sheriff's motorcycle to pay rent at the hotel so I decided to hitch a ride with a military battalion that was passing through Dallas on their way to take Shreveport. So they thought, little did they know that the Confederates were already encroaching on Longview. I faded in and out of consciousness as we drove along damaged Interstates. It became increasingly obvious that we were approaching the capitol as we passed the occasional trader, traveler, and truck. While the Old World Dallas had been burnt to ashes by thermonuclear fire, a perhaps better Dallas rose to fill the void. It was the only place in the Texas Union where true civilization remained. While other cities like Longview or San Antonio had become specialized in trading or arms manufacturing, Dallas was the one place where there were libraries, schools, and art still existed. We approached the huge capitol and proceeded down the main thoroughfare, Avenue of The Union. It was my first trip to post-war Dallas and I personally thought that the new Dallas looked better than the one that came before it. The Union government had tried to model The Avenue after the National Mall in D.C. Grand buildings for our government agencies lined the cobblestone avenue. The truck came to a stop in front the Hexagon which was a play on the Old World Pentagon in D.C.

I would be going no further with the battalion and decided to explore the capitol a little bit before I tried to meet with President Pierce. Across the street from the Hexagon was the newly-built Union Archive which held all works relevant to our fine nation. There was a line out the door to see their newest exhibit, "Meet the Chronicler of the Waste!" the banner read and I felt tempted to join the others in the line but I had to stay focused. The Chronicler had been writing down the story of our nation since its founding so that when we fix the world future generations will look back and see what a struggle early life in the Texas Union was. I kept walking down The Avenue and soon the towering Capitol Building was in sight. Our Capitol Building wasn't as awe-inspiring as the pre-war one in D.C. but in post-apocalyptic terms it was a gem.

After nearly twenty minutes of walking I finally reached the steps of the Capitol Building and let out a sigh of relief as hopefully my journey was almost over. The building was crowded as "law-makers", press, and tourist were everywhere. I talked to a kind receptionist and before I knew it I was sitting face to face with the President in his office. We discussed the issues at Longview and the death of the Secretary of Defense. President Pierce was saddened by the news and declared that the Confederates' actions would not go unnoticed. He would be sending all available battalions to counter the threat in Longview. Just when I thought the meeting was over the President decided that I was going to replace Secretary Hughes as the new Secretary of Defense. I was shocked. He said that if I was capable of surviving the massacre at Fort Reaper than I was capable of anything. I begged him that military service was not my thing and that I was a doctor not soldier but the President would not take no for an answer. I was taken immediately to a Congressional swearing-in where I was applauded by an enormous crowd.

The President secured my 'limo' which really was just an old taxi painted black to give it an executive look. My "advisor" Mr. Isidro showed me around the capitol and then led me to my new office. I really did not want to be here, I just wanted to go home. But I realized that our nation's fate I hold in my own hands. I now had the power to stop this mess and win the war. I would learn that this was a fast-paced job as I would be leaving tomorrow to oversee that the battle would be a quick and decisive victory for us. I went to bed for tomorrow was sure to be a long day. I thought that war would be easy but once we left everything started going to hell in a hand basket. Besides I learned that day it's not polite to be late to your own funeral.


	7. Chapter 7

Caleb Martin

Period 4

April 18, 2013

Chapter 7

"War, war never changes." These words could not have held truer despite the fact that humanity had nearly been decimated by an apocalypse. War today looked like war in the Old World. In tattered rags and bearing decrepit pre-war weapons, our Texas soldiers marched to the slaughter that awaited them in Longview and dammit I had never considered suicide harder than I did that day. It all started going downhill when our convoy of pre-war armored cars was hit by a Confederate roadside bomb hastily built using a pressure cooker, some nails, and a bit of fireworks along I-20. My battalion made camp there for the night to bury the dead. I couldn't help but cry at the sight of the fourteen charred and disfigured bodies of good Texas Union troops getting tossed into a giant pit.

The dinner rations were terrible and I now know why. As new Secretary of Defense I had access to certain information about the inner workings of our "fine" nation. I looked through my mission file for miscellaneous info and found some things that were pretty interesting. Apparently the rations, which were mostly bread, are all composed of sixty-percent sawdust as to give the food 'bulk'. It was based on World War Two research abandoned in a filing cabinet at an old office building. I pitied the soldiers as they ate and almost thought about telling them about the wood they were eating but I figured that doing so might anger them and I needed them as loyal as possible before the battle. We all slept well that night.

When we got up the next morning we all piled in to the few remaining armored cars and set off along Interstate 20. We would soon be approaching the small city of Canton, Texas which was the last known town to still be held by the Union east of Dallas. The plan was to spend a few days in Canton to resupply before we tried to retake nearby Tyler, Texas. Plans were made to go wrong through. As we were approaching a bridge near the city we were stopped by a new checkpoint along I-20. I told them our intentions but they said the Interstate east of here was on lockdown. I became suspicious and asked to see their supervisor and me reply was a gun to the head. They were Confederate guards posing as Union officers. I told the lead convoy driver to gun the throttle and he barreled through the checkpoint. Everything for the next five minutes was a blur and all I can remember is fire and falling. When I regained consciousness I looked up and saw that the bridge was nothing but a smoldering, twisted heap of metal and concrete. I frantically looked around saw that all the convoy vehicles were on the bottom of what seemed to a canyon. The bridge had been blown up and half of my battalion was either dead or missing. The unfortunate survivors would be forced to walk nearly forty miles with only the supplies scavenged from the convoy.

This began the march. It began to remind me of the Bataan Death March which I had read about in text books as a child in pre-war schooling. It became more miserable as we marched further on. The terrain became less and less of the favorable desert expanse and more and more of a humid and swampy bog. The heat was unbearable and most of us weren't prepared for such a hike. We went a little over ten miles per day and in two days we found ourselves in Canton. The town was a complete wreck. It appeared that the Confederates had ransacked the place and were in the process of turning it into a fortress. Charred buildings and dead bodies laid scattered across the town. With their fortress unfinished perhaps the Confederates fled upon hearing word of our arrival because all but one dead Confederate weren't there. We made camp in Canton for two days to get some much needed rest.

My men and I left to liberate Tyler from the Confederates with four abandoned trucks but we remained alert as we were now in Confederate territory. All was good until we were about 20 miles outside of Tyler and our battalion's Geiger counter started ticking off the charts. We stopped and looked for a source when my binoculars spotted something disturbing. On the horizon a makeshift launch pad could be made out and it had what appeared to be a primitive rocket that was maybe 15 or 20 feet tall. It resembled a missile and it was a nuclear one. While nowhere near the destructive power and technical complexity of their pre-war counterparts that divided the New World from the Old World, their nuke appeared to be constructed from a bunch of garbage cans filled with irradiated waste.

It didn't matter where the Confederates were planning to launch their nuke, the Texas Union couldn't afford to lose any one of its communities. This only accelerated our need to retake Longview and push the horde of Confederates back across our borders. Even if we failed I would make sure to use this nuke to take more than a few Confederates with me to hell.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8**

The battalion and I crept up the hill in the darkness to the poorly lit launch pad of the Confederate missile. I sent a team of three of my best to reconnaissance the site. I grew nervous that they might blow the mission because I heard them stumbling around in the dark into the bushes and making tons of noise in the process. I was in luck. Maybe a half hour later, the squad returned back to the rest of the battalion who were waiting silently at the base of the hill and reported that there seemed to be minimal Confederate presence at their own launch site. I was relieved. I started sending one squad silently after the other to start crawling up the hill and everything had seemed to be running smoothly until I heard and saw an explosion where my highest squad was. Screaming shortly followed and more explosions were lighting up the sky like the fourth of July. I had thought that this operation had been going a little too smoothly and now I had led half my battalion straight into a minefield. More explosions and screams as I had to sit at the base of the hill with the remainder of the battalion watching my troopers guts flinging in every which way. This was truly war, and it terrified the hell out of me. As I remember my world history, or maybe it was my reel history, teacher at Longview High School many years ago had told me about a famous Admiral named Akbar who had said "It's a trap!". I was now in his shoes, this was not just a trap, it was a disaster. Half my brothers in arms lay slain before the true battle had even started and it was all my fault.

If my scouts careless fumbling in the darkness hadn't managed to awaken any of the sleeping Confederate troopers, than surely the sound of their booby-trap minefield going off would have done the trick. The whole base was now on alert and it wouldn't be long before they'd come and engage us. I had to figure out a way to get the remainder of my troops up the hill and through the minefield before the Confederates came and mowed us down. After a good five minutes of thinking, I came up with a plan. I would have a squad clear a path through the minefield by pushing an old truck from a nearby road up the hill and that should in theory set off any of the remaining mines. After watching three squads struggle to push the enormous eighteen wheeler up the hill for about fifteen minutes, all the remaining mines had been set off and I sent all remaining troops with me up the hill to engage the Confederates and help me destroy the Confederate nuclear missile. In about an hour of heavy fighting, we had managed to slaughter all the Confederate troops and all that was left to do was to destroy the missile. We approached it and it was massive, over twenty feet tall. It seemed to be hooked up to an old Apple II computer and looked as though it was about to be launched within the hour had we not arrived. I sent my squad who was comprised of pre-war tech geeks and former engineers to figure out the missile and its targeting system. After nearly two hours of examining the primitive "nuke", the senior squad leader had informed me that the missile was currently targeted for Dallas but that the target coordinates could be reset. I was thrilled, instead of simply destroying the missile, we could now use their own weapon against them.

I pulled out my Texarkana regional map and instructed the squad to input the coordinates for the Interstate 20 bridge over the Red River in the Confederate garrison of Shreveport. Even though destroying the bridge would do little to none collateral damage to Shreveport, the destruction of the Interstate 20 bridge would slow the advance of more Confederate troops to Longview and stop their wartime supply lines. To any fledging post-apocalyptic nation your (crumbling) Interstates and highways are like the arteries and veins of your country. If you slash these arteries than your nation starts bleeding out in the form of money and goods, which is bad for business. All the remaining troops and I stepped away from the missile as its thrusters started to glow a bright orange. Seeing the missile arc through the sky was even better than watching that rocket launch at Johnson Space Center in Houston in college. All the troops started cheering and I joined in hooting and hollering, For our success today I decided we shall make camp at this launch pad for tonight so that we may be well rested for our long march home towards Longview. We will beat those Confederates savages across the state line and frankly I can't wait to see their miserable faces when they realize that we have showed up and their reinforcements/supplies won't be coming in for awhile. After all, in this dog-eat-dog kind of world, what goes around comes back around.


End file.
